74 percent of analyzed samples show presence of mycotoxin

Biomin has released its report on global mycotoxin research for 2011, focusing on global prevalence with a region-by-region breakdown of the various mycotoxins most important to animal and agriculture production.

Seventy-four percent of the analyzed samples show the presence of at least one mycotoxin. The presence of more than one mycotoxin in 41 percent of the samples raises the attention to the problem of synergistic effects caused by multiple mycotoxins in animal feeds, said Biomin in the company's report.

The global occurrence of aflatoxins, zearalenone, deoxynivalenol, fumonisins and ochratoxin A were studied, with 4,327 samples taken from North and South America, Asia (South-East, South and North), Oceania and Europe (Northern, Central, Southern and Eastern) and the Middle East and Africa. Samples tested were diverse, according to Biomin, ranging from cereals such as corn, wheat, barley and rice to processing by-products such as soybean meal, corn gluten meal, dried distillers grains with solubles and other fodder such as straw, silage and finished feed.

Deoxynivalenol was the most common mycotoxin found (59 percent tested positive). Second-most prevalent was fumonisins (51 percent), then zearalenone (40 percent), aflatoxins (27 percent) and ochratoxin A (27 percent).